


Death Mate

by jinxes (bobbemorse)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-05
Updated: 2015-08-05
Packaged: 2018-04-13 01:22:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4502355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bobbemorse/pseuds/jinxes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lydia finds herself with death as a soulmate. Malia can't find a name anywhere on her body. It might be a fit, if you squint.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Death Mate

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this took me forever.
> 
> In the first paragraphs this story is pretty character heavy to establish a base and I had a lot of fun with that, as you might notice.

Her first name appears when she is five years old, on the back of her neck, just below the hairline. Lydia's mom almost doesn't catch it but then she does, when she brushes her daughter's hair and it's a name Lydia has never heard of but she smiles nonetheless because this means that there is someone out there. 

Two days later she catches her mother crying in front of the TV. Lydia's breath catches when she hears the name of the victim of the car crash. She sinks to her scraped knees and holds onto one of her mother's legs, leaning her head against her thigh.  
“I didn't even get to know him,” she whispers, over and over and over again. But the clock on the heavy table behind her kept ticking. 

A second name blooms on her shoulder blade in her second week of primary school. It tingles a little, like when Lydia caught a wasp stinging her. When she comes home she turns in front of the mirror to see who it is but even though she can read since she was four she isn't quite fluent in mirror writing so she asks her dad to read it for her.

This time it's merely a day before Lydia begins to feel sick, first like she's been punched in the stomach then a slow nausea when she sees the report of a missing person on the news.  
“She's dead,” she says numbly and her father picks her up, like he hasn't done in years and tells her that there's still a chance and that she won't know until they find her but the thing is – Lydia knows. Her soulmate is dead. Again. 

It has to happen three more times for her to start thinking she's cursed. 

*

She gets used to the sudden sick feeling, to the names slowly fading, to the new ones that come again and again and again.  
She starts dressing herself, brushing her own hair, taking care that her parents don't ever see the names that are intertwined and lay over one another but still keep coming because not one of them is constant and everyone who appears has a week to live, at best. 

Rationally, she knows that it's impossible that every single person who will die within a week is documented on her back but the thought that there are more people out there who feel what she does when one of them dies, just a thousand times worse, makes her sick, so she chooses to think of the names that are fading on her skin as the only ones suffering.

*

Lydia gets together with Jackson and it's easy at first, it fits. It's highly logical, too. It takes a lot more effort than usual to hider her mark riddled back from him but somehow she manages. Maybe because Jackson is not really interested enough to ask.  
It gets a lot harder when she meets Allison, the girl who cares so fiercely and genuinely that sometimes Lydia wants to crawl back into her safe, comfortable little space next to Jackson, as an accessoire that is never really of use.

Allison won't let her, always keeping Lydia without even knowing she's doing it.  
And Lydia wants to tell her, she really does.

But then she watches Allison talk about helping people and she has to excuse herself so she can go to the bathroom and gather herself because when has she ever made an effort to help any of these people?  
She loosens her bra strap and lets her fingers slide over the newest addition, _Lyla Johnson_. Maybe they're a nice old person, who dies of old age, Lydia thinks. She tries to convince herself of that every time. 

“Lydia?” Allison comes up behind her, with a curious look in her eyes, that makes Lydia's marks burn on her skin.  
“Are you okay?”  
“'Course,” she says, adjusts her bra strap and her shirt and starts washing her hands to avoid looking at Allison.  
“You'll find them.” Her voice is reassuring, knowing. 

Allison has a couple of names in a ring around her arm just below her shoulder. Lydia's name is there and Scott McCall's, then there's a Kira Yukimura and a Isaac Lahey. Below that there is another ring. _Nous protégeons ceux qui ne peuvent pas se protéger eux-mêmes._ It happens sometimes, that there aren't just names but relevant sayings or statements that will change your life one day.  
Lydia just has names that are going to be erased from existence the second they appear on her body. 

“Yeah,” she says absentmindedly. A short look in the mirror, into her own eyes shows her that she never will. 

*

Of course, Allison finds out eventually. 

She looks at Lydia with an expression of legitimate concern which makes it that much harder to face her.  
“This one,” Lydia says and lets her hand linger under the name that sticks out against the pale skin of her hipbone and the faded names, that looked like hundreds of entwined scars.  
“...appeared yesterday. They're going to die within a week.”

“Does it hurt when they...”  
“...die,” says Lydia in – what she likes to think – a determined tone but it comes out more defeated. Like she is incredibly tired of death following her around. Which she is. She cocks her head to one side and thinks about it for a minute.  
“No,” she decides.  
“It's desensitizing. Every time a mark fades it hurts less and less. Or I'm going more numb with every death.” 

She shrugs, more nonchalant than she would like to and Allison tries to keep her gasp silent but Lydia hears it nonetheless. 

*

She doesn't even bother checking the names anymore. It feels pointless, like she's making a commitment.  
The little flicker of hope - that she won't feel so guilty if she doesn't form an attachment to the letters on her back - breaks through and it's so much easier to put on her clothes without checking in the mirror to see, if someone is going to die today. 

She discovers the fine lines of Erica's name when she's back from the funeral.  
Her hyper vigilance after that catches Boyd's name but it doesn't save him. 

Lydia manages for a good while to not even think about why she is also always the one who finds the dead bodies and why she seems to be the one with hearing that extends to another level of existence. Allison's eyes are always trained on her when they discover a new body, though, and Lydia always shivers in anticipation of the stinging behind her eyes but she isn't ready to make the connection, not yet, _not yet_.

Until she can't run anymore.

Specifically because she is tied to a chair and an insane woman is trying to murder her. She makes her scream and Lydia does and hates herself because it's freeing – to scream. Like she can make life leave her body before she actually dies.

After, when she isn't almost being strangled to death anymore, the relief she feels makes her knees buckle.  
Banshee, Jennifer had said.  
_There is a word_ , Lydia thinks, while she nods at Allison who is asking a lot of concerned questions and leans into Scott who keeps one of his hands on her back while she's being inspected by the medics. 

_There is a word._

***

Malia is born with a triple spiral between her shoulder blades. Her parents tell her that the meaning is going to reveal itself when it's supposed to. Her mom traces the spiral when she puts Malia to bed. Her dad puts his hand over it on Malia's first day of school. Her sister insists on kissing it good night.  
Malia is strangely in love with her mark.  
Until she isn't anymore. 

The thing she remembers most vividly about the accident is the sound the tires made on the lonely street and then all she remembers is the blood and the ground changing under her feet, her paws, from the rough asphalt of the road to the yielding ground of the forest. 

Animals don't have soul marks. They don't have soul mates.  
It's kind of soothing, knowing that fate doesn't play a role out in the woods where it's cold and ruthless and lonely but also quiet and simple and everyone is self reliant.  
She starts thinking that maybe this is how it's meant to be for her. Maybe she doesn't have to have a name tattoed on her body, maybe she can choose her own destiny.  
Maybe she is just supposed to be this. A coyote.  
Maybe she can forget about the spiral that is just a fading memory now. 

But she can't quite shake away the feeling of something ingrained on her back even though she keeps telling herself that there is fur and she is an animal and that there is no going back. No matter how much it sometimes hurts to rip apart another living being because her teeth seem more human than other days.  
She'll get used to it.

(She never gets used to it.)

After she returns to her dad, she tries to ignore the twitch on her back whenever he looks at her like he can't really believe she's there with him. Sometimes he tears up randomly in a grocery store and Malia knows that she should do something or be happy that he is so overwhelmed by seeing her again but it just makes her want to fold her arms around herself and run into the woods because she killed them, both of them, her family. _Their family._

How can he live with that when she isn't able to?

*

She searches for a name for a few weeks after she becomes human again. She looks everywhere without knowing if the feeling low, low in her gut is hope or dread or something inbetween. 

There is no name.  
Just the triple spiral, as expressive and lonely on her back as ever. 

*

Scott wears long sleeved shirts for the first few times Malia meets him which is why she doesn't see his marks until she comes over to Stiles' one day, looking forward to enjoying some of the more pleasant things of this new life.

As soon as Stiles realized that Malia doesn't know any movie or tv show or video game that came out in the last nine years, he immediately took it as the challenge to introduce her to everything. Preferrably in marathon sessions that apparently sometimes took priority over school work.

("In a way," Stiles had said while sliding the third season of Doctor Who into the DVD Player.  
"you can learn a lot about history and politics from this show." He squints and cocks his head to the side before he corrects himself.  
"Although you probably shouldn't take everythig literally. I mean, aliens may be out there but since they haven't tried to kill us yet you can maybe let the search after a sonic screwdriver be.")

Stiles also showed her his marks while they were still in Eichen House, not even attempting to hide them. The most prominent name is Scott McCall, inked stark and sure on Stiles' hipbone. Under that there is a row of names to most of which he doesn't know the matching person yet, except for Melissa McCall and Lydia Martin, whose mark formed just last year.  
There is nothing else for him, just names.

Simple and secure reminder that there are people who are tied to him.

When she reaches Stiles' house she can already hear Scott and him talking in familiar patterns. They fall into it so easily and Malia is pretty sure they don't even know how special it is that they can rely on this, the familiarity, the routine, the trust between them endless. 

The sheriff lets her in, smiling at her absent mindedly while he shrugs on his jacket and presses his cheek against his phone, listening intently. Malia smells the stress roll off of him and frowns. Stiles has been pretty worried about his dad ever since he had to be admitted to Eichen House. Apparently it costs a fortune. Her dad doesn't seem to have any problems with it and if he does, he's not telling her. Malia sighs. She's probably not going to be able to stop him from trying to protect her for the rest of his life. 

When she comes into Stiles' room her eyes are immediately drawn to Scott. Her time in the woods has taught her to pay attention to details and she's good at picking up changes, even if the others don't think so.  
Malia is pretty sure that they just don't get how heightened an animals' senses have to be to survive years in the wild. She may not be good at social cues yet but that doesn't mean that she doesn't register every tid bit of information she can get without someone laying it out for her. 

Today, Scott is wearing a t-shirt. It's probably nothing unusual but for Malia it's a new sight and it throws her off for a moment because she can _see his marks_. It's something she would have asked about a long time ago if Stiles wouldn't have warned her against asking people about their marks as one of the first things he taught her about "sometimes demented social principles you should follow if you don't want to end up like me in middle school." 

(When she had looked at him questioningly he supplied: "A social outcast with an obsession over a girl who didn't notice me and an impressive lack of talent for the one sport that is played in this town which the best player never failed to acknowledge with some impressively condescending looks."

Malia had nodded and decided to take Stiles' tips to heart.)

There are two rings engraved on Scott's arm, one thicker than the other and inbetween them there's a ring of names that Malia can't identify from where she stands. 

"Hey Malia," Scott says, with an undertone that Malia thinks is uncertainty and looks down at his arm.  
"I've never seen yours before," she says in what she hopes is an apologetic tone. He smiles and traces the ring of names with his hand.  
"I still don't know what the black rings mean but the names are all pretty clear." He gets up and walks over to her, stretching out his arm to show her.

He doesn't smell anxious and his heart beat is completely at ease so Malia reads. There's Stiles, of course, and Allison, which is to be expected but the name is fading to a bunch of small scars and when she looks up at Scott he looks pained but he nods at her to continue reading. Derek Hale comes next and then Isaac Lahey, Erica Reyes, Vernon Boyd, all people whom Stiles has told her about. They're all part of the very messed up not-following-natures-laws McCall Pack.

"Isaac appeared when Derek bit him. As well as Boyd and Erica," Scott says quietly and Stiles hasn't made a comment yet so this demonstration of Scotts marks is obviously something important. Malia furrows her brow and identifies the next names as Lydia Martin and Kira Yukimura. The banshee and the kitsune.

In the woods she's never heard of either of those creatures but Stiles researches more about this stuff than for school and it's kind of captivating to watch him get sidetracked and find all the connections between all the different branches of the supernatural while simultaneously trying to figure out the full capabalites of everyone he knows. 

All Malia knows is that Scott makes it look so easy to be in control of the animalistic side of it all because he is anchored in his humanity, always knowing that he belongs here, in a house with his mom, going to school and trying, always trying to be better, whereas Malia doesn't even know what she's supposed to expect when she goes to school  
She never tells, about her biting urge to flee back into the security of her fur, even though she knows she'd hate herself because either way, human or coyote she's always going to want the other thing.

She's never actually met Lydia and Kira before but she's pretty sure Lydia's the girl Stiles was infatuated with for so long who didn't even spare him a second glance. Because sometimes Stiles pulse quickens when he talks about her and he uses more hand gestures than he usually does (which is an awful lot already). 

And while Stiles tells her about how Lydia pretended to be dumb for the sake of popularity for a long time and how she is way more impressive now, not only with her powers but with her stubborn streak and her determination, Scott talks about her in a completely different way. 

When he tells Malia about every weird little pack member of his he speaks of her courage and her protective streak when it comes to her friends. He smiles when he explains how they developed over the years, always him and Stiles at the core of his story but with the others being presented as just as important. 

When he gets to Allison's death his voice breaks but it grows steady again when he tells her about Kira and Isaac and the upcoming school year. He tells her he's sure that she's gonna get a hang of using her powers until then and that he himself had difficulties with his grades for a while and that if he can manage to pick himself up she can, too, he's certain of it.

It's all so incredibly human that Malia has to grab the edge of his desk to stop herself from shrinking down and jumping out of the window, always, always landing on her feet. 

She's violently pulled out of her thoughts by her own name.  
Her own name on someone elses skin. 

Without thinking about it she raises her hand and lets it hover over Scott's arm. He looks at her, nothing unsure or unfriendly in his look, he knows she's there and he's okay with it. She thinks.

"Since when do you have that?" Scott shrugs.  
"I think I got it some time during your stay in Eichen House. Every name from the pack is on here."  
"Hm," she says, frowning and Stiles quips up.  
"What hm?" he asks and she looks at him questioningly.  
"You do that! You say hm when you think ou have nothing important to say but you still thought of something. What hm?"

Malia shrugs.  
"It's just that... this fits. Normally, marks manifest at a young age and then they stay the same unless someone dies." Both of them wince but Malia decides not to bat an eye.

"But with your marks, Scott, it's different. I think it's because your pack is so unusual. I mean, from what I've gathered from Stiles' rants a kitsune should not be in a werewolf pack and a huntress sure as hell shouldn't be and you've never actually bitten anyone and yet here you are, with a pack. You bent the rules and the marks actually adapted to it."

Scott smiles and there is nothing condescending in there, nothing that says that she should just have shut up already.  
"Well, now you're officially part of this, too, I guess." 

*

Stiles actually brings her to the teacher that is supposed to show her around the school and give her her time table and all these things that Malia isn't used to even though this is what _normal_ is supposed to feel like for her. 

Her dad has been crazy excited at breakfast, didn't even make a comment about Stiles showing up at their door to pick Malia up. He just hugged her, secure and so much like eight years ago because this, this is what she remembered from her human time. Her dad being there, unconditionally, no matter how busy or mad or happy or stressed he was, he'd always hug her when she left the house. 

She felt the tension leaving his body when she put her arms around him in a determined, fluid motion. She remembers thinking _muscle memory_ , when she squeezes and smiles and waves him goodbye, leaving him with a grin on a face that actually made her forget about the anxiety flourishing in her gut for a moment. 

In the presence of Coach Finstock it comes slamming into her. She doesn't know how to do this. She may be willing to do it and to work for it but right at this moment she looks at Finstock and sees someone with expectations. Expectations to meet a normal, _human_ girl and Malia may not be ashamed of her nature, of her approach of things but that sure as hell doesn't take the fear away. 

She nods when he hands her the time table she's going to have to follow for the next year and she nods again when he launches himself into a long rant about choosing your friends carefully with a lot of very purposefully placed jabs at Stiles.  
It helps when he just keeps on talking and Malia can focus on calming her heart rate and finding Stiles and Scotts' pulses in the number of students she can hear. 

It's when the Coach leads her down the stairs that she hears it, Scott's heartbeat still calm and heavy in her ears.  
"And I know I'm still just the new girl at school," a voice says and Malia tunes Finstock out because something irks her. 

Malia's thoughts race to Stiles telling her about all the people in his life, stopping at Kira and debating the possibility of this girl actually being her. Considering how small Beacon Hills is, she deems it very likely and starts to skim over the students in the hallway at the bottom of the stairwell. 

She identifies a girl with her back to Malia as the owner of the voice, as Kira. Opposite to her stands another girl looking at Kira intently, her red hair open and she's standing in high heels like it's the most natural thing in the world. 

(It's not. Malia tried. Scott had smiled at her and said that now, that she was human again, she could try out what she was comfortable in and some found empowerment in heels. Malia didn't and Stiles had laughed at her and Scott had hidden his laugh terribly.)

Lydia Martin, Malia concludes and doesn't think her hair looks like strawberries at all, what the hell, Stiles?

Before Malia can focus on Finstock again, Lydia looks up and spots her, her face showing no sign of surprise or immediate mistrust, just plain recognition.  
"Not for long," she says to Kira and when she and the Coach walk by them Lydia smiles at Malia, fleeting and earnest, her heart beat calm and steady. 

Malia smiles back.

*

The very first thing Malia learns about Lydia that is not told by another person is that Lydia is _irritating_. Sure, Scott told her that she might have to get used to the smell for which he earned himself an expressive head motion of Stiles, but that is by far not all of it. 

Kira, too, makes Malia frown sometimes, but not more than other people.  
Lydia is outright provoking.  
Of course Malia notices early on that something is different in the way she shields herself, but then again Stiles has those moments, too. 

Nevertheless she seems almost aggressive in her treatment of people, not bothering to hide her eye rolling or her comments, constantly putting everyone in their place. It's almost like Lydia's rooted in a different reality and feels the need to remind everyone of that, sometimes with a bite and sharp edge to her words. 

Then she turns around and her face goes soft, touching Scott's elbow when they all don't know what's going on, wanting to help so badly. 

It is just... _irritating_.

*

Contrary to what Stiles believes she doesn't actually have to see the list for her to realize what the only mark she ever had means.  
She caught him too many times glancing at her back and his heart beating faster when Derek even so much as attempts to interact with her. (Not that he does that a lot, but it happens often enough for Malia to get a grasp on Stiles' weird behaviour whenever it does.)

The way he and Scott always go right out of werecoyote earshot is additionally suspicious. 

Malia won't lie. She is curious about who she is, always with the thought of her mother and her sister in the back of her mind like maybe, maybe her mark can give her an answer as to what happened that night.  
Maybe destiny would actually make sense this one time. Just for her.  
But it doesn't. 

Everything she found either brought her to mythology and lycanthropy or to Beacon Hills' history.  
And really, the Hales aren't half as subtle as they apparently think they are. There are reports everywhere that practically prove the existence of supernatural beings, especially werewolves and there is more than one article in which there are complains about the Hales' strange and suspicious family traditions. 

The spiral turns up more than once. 

Her mark might as well be a name.  
Being a Hale is literally her destiny. 

That Derek is the one who also wears the spiral and not Peter only makes her feel slightly better.

***

The thing is that Lydia really thought she was done hiding from the truth all the time, especially the truth about herself. She has spent so much time trying to come up with ways to seem different from the girl she is because she thought it would give her the power to actually change something.  
(It doesn't. It never does.)

Then she thought she had gotten over that.  
But Malia turns up, so blunt that it throws Lydia off and makes her heart hurt because she doesn't think Malia has ever lied, to anyone.  
At first it makes Lydia think she's merciless, too rough at the edges, not able to adapt to the subtlety of to the interactions of Lydia and her friends. 

It's when she sees her interact with Stiles and Scott that she changes her mind.  
Scott has a way of getting under someone's skin, so the loyalty Malia shows him so soon is not particularly surprising but that she warms up to Stiles so quickly kind of surprises Lydia.

(One day the others have to head to the library during break, leaving Lydia to witness Malia laughing and waving at Stiles who whispered something in her ear before turning around.  
"What made you trust him that fast?" She asks and Malia's intense look shows confusion. That little crease between her eyebrows appears, like it always does when she's trying to figure something out.

"What do you mean?"  
"I mean, you met him when he was possessed by one of the most evil spirits we have ever encountered and yet you two have been thick as thieves coming out of Eichen House. When you met us you said you'd eat us multiple times and we posed absolutely no threat to you."

Malia thinks about it for a second, then shrugs like it's supposed to mean something.

"The first time Stiles and I actually spoke I was naked in the mens' room and I still felt like I had control over the situation. That doesn't happen often." 

She says it in a tone that is absolutely nonchalant and shrugs it off with a second lift of her shoulders but it makes Lydia feel like a splinter got caught in her chest.  
They never talk about it again.)

And Lydia starts to see that Malia's changing, that she is trying, really trying, to observe and to adapt accordingly. She is still uncomfortably blunt but Lydia probably needs to reexamine just why it makes her wince sometimes. 

It's the knowledge that Malia won't protect her from herself, Lydia realizes. After everything Lydia has been through, after everything she has endured wth her friends, with her pack she still expects them to protect her. She still expects that they will let her sort out her own problems that are too big for her. 

Of course, Scott is too nice to flat out tell her that she should just ask for help because he is a big believer in the principle that if people want to talk to him, they should come on their own terms. Which is good and simple and Lydia is glad that he isn't becoming an absolutely obsessive alpha but that also means that she can afford to shield certain aspects of herself from him. 

Malia doesn't cut her any slack.  
She says the wrong things at the wrong time, relies solely on her instincts sometimes and she is absolutely utterly unsetteling. As soon as Lydia is in proximity to her she feels like Malia can look into the core of her being and Lydia is not entirely sure if she wants someone she barely knows and doesn't trust - not yet - to be able to look at her like that. 

And all that even though Malia still doesn't catch the subtle things, slight shifts in demeanour, seemingly insignificant adjustments of the body or the minor changes in someone's voice.  
It's kind of infuriating.

*

It's on a Friday afternoon that the doorbell rings and when Lydia opens the door there's Malia, with her backpack on and a desperate expression on her face.  
"Can you help me?" She blurts out, without so much as a hello but Lydia just raises an eyebrow and doesn't say anything. Letting Stiles teach Malia about social obligations may not be the smartest decision they ever made. 

"With what?" But she already knows that whatever it is, she's probably going to do it because before Malia rang at the door she was trying to decide wether she should do her homework in advance or go visit Allison and no matter how much she sometimes loves the quiet in the graveyard, she thinks it's probably not good for a dead person to take up this much of her time. 

Unconsciously she lifts her hand and places it on her neck for a second where Allison's name sits, right under the first mark Lydia ever got. She regrets it, as soon as Malia's eyes narrow for a second.  
"I don't understand any of the stuff we've been doing in maths," she says, instead of asking, though and Lydia is simultaneously grateful and afraid, because she knows that Malia is going ask her about it soon.  
"And we have a test on monday that I really need to pass. So, can you help me?"

Lydia sighs and holds the door open for Malia to slip through. 

*

„So what? Was your ex-boyfriend stupid?“ Lydia snaps around.  
_„What?“_ Jackson still stings, a gaping black hole, making her feel cut up and guilty because she felt him die and his name still isn't engraved on her skin.  
"I mean,“ Malia says and if Lydia didn't know better her voice'd ring annoyed in her ears but it's more likely that her frustration over having upset someone is seeping into her voice.  
"how did he not notice? Your scars reach up to your neck, I noticed it like three days after meeting you.“

Lydia wants to say: _That's a first, actually, nobody has ever picked it up that quick._ Instead she just shrugs half heartedly.  
"I guess it was never important enough.“ The look Malia gives her isn't filled wih pity but an unreadable... something that Lydia can't quite pin down. 

"Can I come over on Saturday again?" Lydia contemplates and looks over at Kira who's sitting opposite to her with her headphones on. She leans over and snatches one of the earbuds out.  
"Are you free on Saturday?" Kira exchanges a look with Malia and nods slowly.  
"I have practice on Sunday, though. And Scott wanted to meet up after that." Lydia turns to Malia.  
"One pm at my place." Malia nods and walks away.

When she turns her back to her Lydia sees the claws peeking through the gaps of her closed fist. 

*

The realization kind of creeps on to her.  
It's not the obligation or the desperation she had with Jackson. It isn't the heat or the torn feeling she had with Aiden either. It most certainly isn't the feeling she had with the couple of guys she hooked up with over holidays. 

It comes more natural and tame.  
With a touch of Malia's hand on her back that sets her heart afloat and sneaks itself into Lydia's thoughts when she gets ready for bed.  
Then there are the fleeting smiles, private and intimate, that escape Lydia without her meaning to. 

She catches herself looking at Malia with admiration when they're stretched out on the floor together because this is a girl who lived in the woods for half her life and she's in the same grade as Lydia, probably just because she is too stubborn to let anything get in her way. 

It's when Malia first startles a laugh out of her, that's when Lydia realizes that she's kind of fucked. 

Lydia is not a girl who laughs.  
She's someone who smiles, sure, even someone who smiles a lot, always in different ways and not always true to how she feels. Sometimes she smiles to get through the day, sometimes she smiles to hide herself until she can't muster up the energy anymore. 

But she doesn't laugh often.  
It's just not something she does. So, when she laughs at something Malia's said it comes out as a soft snort because Lydia doesn't expect it to happen. The second the laughter bursts out of her, she feels something settle inside her chest. Something deep, something probably meaningful. Something soothing. 

There is also the sense that she's losing control, that she needs to backpedal because this is not her area. She still spends a lot of time on controlling her reactions, her urge to scream, her expression when it starts to sting on her back in the middle of class and her movements in proximity to other people because anyone could judge anything she does. 

Malia doesn't seem to have that problem. It makes something loosen in Lydia. It makes her feel like she doesn't have to worry about that stuff. It makes her brave. 

And some of the time she's irritated by what Malia says, some of the time she is thrown for a moment but most of the time she is impressed by Malia's fast pace of learning, by her desire to learn more.  
She doesn't think anyone realizes how remarkable it really is.

Because Lydia understands the drive to learn more, although for her it's often out of pure boredom, but she sure as hell can't even begin to fathom how difficult it is to be this far behind - well, everything and not give up out of simple frustration.  
Even when she wasn't truthful to the capacity of her intelligence she has always been aware that she was, is and probably always will be ahaed of most people.

Therefore, when she lays next to Malia on her bed and sees all the things she doesn't understand yet marked in red she wants to tell her that her learning curve is rather impressive but she just finds herself correcting mistakes and pushing for more and yet Malia never complains. 

*

Lydia makes it her resolution to help Malia get on top pf her game. If she gets a dry throat whenever she's trying to tell Malia how good she thinks she is, that's her problem. She doesn't need to talk feelings or compliments. 

Basically, she's good with laying next to the girl, reading up on college material and persistently ignoring the twitch between her shoulder blades because Malia notices her every movement and somehow she knows what's on Lydia's back without Lydia ever telling her.

(It was probably Stiles, though. Half the time Lydia's convinced that he's a little in love with the whole of the pack and sometimes he has absolutely no respect for boundaries.)

Malia throws her pen down, pushing her face into Lydia's sheets and Lydia clenches her jaw, suppressing a comment about messing up her bed because they have been here for an hour and a half and it's already too late, anyway. 

"I really hate maths," Malia says, groaning into the soft fabric, while Lydia traces the line of her back with her eyes.  
"You're gonna get it," she says, distracted, staring intensely at the slope of Malia's neck where her hair falls over her shoulder and leaves enough room for Lydia to see the scar that seems to extend to her collarbone. Her fingers twitch before she grabs onto her book again, digging her toes into her pillow.

With an aprupt motion Malia lifts her head and angles it to the side, so she's looking at Lydia.  
"Why did you never ask about my mark?" Lydia breathes out quietly, shakes her head and looks into her book.  
"Don't change the subject. You still have two equations left." Malia stares at her text book and her notes for a second, then rolls herself on her side. 

"No, seriously. Stiles asked like half an hour into meeting me, even though he always tells me that it's private..." She rolls her eyes and Lydia smiles down at the page she's not reading.  
"... and Kira asked - very politely, but she asked. Even Scott did. So, don't you wanna know?" There is something challenging in her eyes. Something mesmerizing, because it's so alive. 

Then she narrows her eyes.  
"Did Stiles tell you?" Lydia frowns disapprovingly and wonders wether Malia wants her to ask or not.  
"He didn't tell me anything related to your soulmark, no."

She feels stupid for not thinking of it.  
Of course she has a special soulmark. People might have multiple names on their skin sometimes but Lydia was told that you feel it, when it's different. According to Scott it's a feeling of finality. 

(Not that it means anything, Scott also says he felt it with Allison and then Kira.) 

Even without that 'special someone' people still normally have names, that aren't hopeless from the moment they form on their skin. Lydia finds herself wondering briefly where Malia's names could lie before she firmly shuts down every thought of Malia's potential soulmarks.

"Good," Malia nods and returns to her notes, tapping her pen against the side of her text book. After a few minutes and without looking up she says evenly:  
"I don't have a name."

"Oh," Lydia says, carefully not acknowledging the way the breath is knocked out of her lungs.

***

It's probably Liam's fault.

They're both with him to watch over his full moon influenced behaviour. He's doing good, though, sitting in his bed relatively quiet with his homework spread out in front of him. Every few minutes he sets down his pen and stretches his fingers, making his knuckles crack which causes Lydia to flinch every time. 

Malia is situated at the end of the bed with her back to Liam but listening in on his movements because she's seen Liam freak out over the loss of control with every full moon shift and she'd really rather not have Lydia here when that happens.

She knows that Lydia's not fazed at all, that this isn't something she deems dangerous enough to be worried about but Malia also knows that intention doesn't always play a role in hurting people.

Nevertheless she tries to focus on her book. She can't remember when she last read a book for pleasure. Keeping up with all the school work and the pack keeps her busy day in and day out (sometimes nights, too). She can't afford to read anything besides school material that still catches her up on what she' missing. 

Malia rubs her eyes in general exhaustion.  
She stills when she hears the sheets ripping under Liam's claws. Whipping her head around her eyes start to glow and she places one hand on Lydia's stomach to push her out of the way. Of course Lydia straightens herself immediately but at least she remains behind Malia. 

Liam looks at her in wild panic and she growls at him in an attempt to get his claws to retract but it has the opposite effect. Sometimes it works, intimidating him into shifting back but the more they do this the smarter the animal in Liam gets.

He shakes off the hand she places on his arm - not daring to hold him back too hard - and slides off the bed out of her reach. When she leaps over the bed he's already out of the window.  
Malia's already shifting back when Lydia comes standing next to her.  
"You just had to scare him away." Malia looks down at her and doesn't recognize the expression on her face that is far too relaxed for this situation.

"Scott is going to kill me," she groans and charges out the door. 

*

"Was the tape really necessary?" Lydia asks, looking down at Liam who is tied up with a satisfied Malia standing over him. She doesn't necessarily like catching and being forced to restrain him but as he gets better at the chase she feels more validated when she does get to prove her superiority in that area.

Looking at Lydia, frowning and panting, she realizes that they're standing in the middle of the street with at least four windows where she can see the light through the curtains.  
"We need to get him off the street," she says and Lydia rolls her eyes.  
"I still haven't figured out how we keep our secrets." 

While she's dragging a struggeling Liam into one of the narrow streets between two houses, Malia can't help but agree. 

Liam's eyes are still glowing so Malia slides down at one of the fences and when Lydia looks at her, hands on her hips she gestures over the restraint body.  
"I'm not dragging him all the way back." Lydia sighs, barely audible and leaving a heavy feeling in Malia's chest, but she sits next to Malia, her knee resting on Malia's sigh which tightens the knot in her heart and makes it kind of hard to breathe normally.

She decides that the responsible thing to do is to close her eyes and throw her head back against the fence.  
They sit in silence for about twenty minutes when Lydia also lets her hand fall down on Malia's leg. In response Malia jumps, which earns her a conflicting look from Lydia. 

Trying her hardest to relax and in a daring mood because they're sitting in the dark and nothing seems really to count she slides her hand into Lydia's.  
Her eyes are closed again but she is hyper aware of the girl next to her, listening to her pulse quicken and feeling her thumb draw a circle on the back of her hand. And another one. And another one. 

If it wasn't for Liam groaning after a few moments she would have no problem with staying like this for the rest of the night.

*

Malia traces the scars on Lydia's back with her fingers, warm and secure up her spine, hesitating just under her shoulder blade.  
„What?“ Lydia's voice is heavy with sleep. Malia closes her eyes for a split second but her voice remains relatively calm when she says:  
„Those are the names of my mom and my sister!“ Lydia stills under her fingers and she feels Lydia's muscles tense in... anticipation? The anxiety hits Malia unexpected along with guilt, settling heavy on her heart that is already wrecked with her own self blame.

„I don't really look at them anymore,“ Lydia says, quietly, slowly like she's scared of something. Scared of Malia. Of what she's going to do.  
It makes Malia angry, the thought of something scaring Lydia. She is so good at seeming untouchable, unafraid, not in the way that Malia is – defensive and aggressive all at once, always making the first move so no one else can dictate her actions.

Lydia is confident and when she can't muster up a real smile she smiles nonetheless and when she's beaten down she just keeps fighting like there's no other option.  
Something leaving Lydia this desperate and raw irritates the hell out of Malia. 

"Have you ever been able to save anyone on here?" Lydia's face is still pressed into her pillow when she shakes her head.  
"Then it's not your fault," Malia says, as determined as she manages. She pushes Lydia's hair over the spot where her fingers rested a second ago and lifts Lydia's chin with her index finger to turn her face towards her, away from the pillow to kiss her.

And right at this moment she isn't even feeling like escaping, like she doesn't quite fit into her body or like she has to choose one way or the other. Because, to be completely honest, she doesn't feel like she needs to fit anything while lying next to Lydia.


End file.
